1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to the field of information processing, and more specifically to a system and method related to multi-source compilation profiles for targeted content sourcing.
2. Description of the Related Art
Use of mobile communication devices (“MCDs”), such as mobile telephones, is wide spread. Many data providers provide content to MCDs that is not specifically selected by users of the MCDs. A user can actively select content by intentionally activating a request for content. An MCD or an application executing on the MCD can also request content without the user's active participation. Content that is not actively requested by a user is referred to herein as “unsolicited content”. When providing unsolicited content, data content providers prefer targeting users of MCDs who are interested in the content provided. More effective targeting generally enhances the value of the content. For example, advertisements represent a type of unsolicited content, and advertisers prefer targeting users interested in purchasing their products. In turn, advertisers compensate advertisement publishers for placement of advertisements, and generally compensate more for placement of advertisements that create the higher economic return.
Personal computer web browser applications, such as Microsoft Corporation's Internet Explorer and the Mozilla Foundation's Firefox, can store certain information about a user including information that can be used to determine a user's actual or inferred interests. Such user information can be stored on a personal computer as data referred to as a “cookie”. Cookies can be accessed by server-side applications and can be utilized to better target advertising to a user.
However, data content providers providing unsolicited content have been less effective in targeting users of MCDs. Many MCDs execute one or more applications. An iPhone™ is a popular type of MCD that supports many native applications including a web browser. iPhones are available from Apple Computer of Cupertino, Calif., USA. Applications allow the MCDs to exchange data with a variety of remote server applications. The data transmitted by the MCD represents actions taken by a user (referred to as “action data”) and contextual data. Contextual data is data transmitted by the MCD that accompanies the action data and can provide some context about the action data. This contextual data does not provide data about the user of the MCD. For example, some MCDs can provide a time of connection, such as a timestamp, between a mobile application and a server as well as the location of the MCD. The time and location represent contextual data. Although the web browser application on an MCD may store a cookie, many other applications on the same MCD currently do not store or share cookies that could provide data useful in targeting unsolicited content to the user of the MCD.
Accordingly, some advertisers providing advertisements to an MCD user focus on contextual advertising and behavioral advertising. Contextual advertising involves using real-time contextual data to select a particular advertisement to send to an MCD. Such advertisements are believed to attract users because they share a similar context as this then-current active data provided by the MCD. For example, sending data from the MCD that a location could return an advertisement for an establishment in proximity to the location.
Behavioral advertising is based on a collection of action data (referred to as “clickstream data”) taken by an MCD user and transmitted by the MCD. The clickstream data is used to gauge the user's interest in a particular advertisement. For example, if the MCD transmits data accessing multiple automotive sites, an advertiser could send the MCD an advertisement from a car dealer.
User's can provide user registration data to a system when a user registers with the system. For example, during registration, a user may provide the user's name, an age range, or other information about the user.
Thus, an advertising system can collects registration data of an MCD user and actively monitor a user's actions and accompanying contextual data as transmitted by the MCD of the user. The collected data is used by the advertising system to target advertisements to an MCD user.